The Great Divide - Professional and Amateur

[Petrus]

I'm sorry, but IMHO a Zoom H1 with a Rode Videomic plugged into it is not going to give a sufficient improvment over most built-in camera mics to be worth spending any money on it at all.

Now you forget that many, if not most, of recent newbie posters are riding the DSLR wave. The video picture quality is great, but audio is practically nonexistant. There is only a cellphone mic like pinprick sized hole somewhere, that is the mic! There is a 3.5mm mic socket, but with autogain only and no monitoring. For these cameras even a 30 year old C-cassette deck would be an improvement, let alone a cheap digital recorder and a separate microphone, ANY microphone, placed closer to the talent, somewhere.

Unfortunatelly some newbies act like they were insulted when they are told that you can not really do anything worthwhile with $100 or $200, like if we were trying to keep secrets.

Updating the gear recommendations in view of the new DLRS craze is in order. With good old cams we needed mics & mixers, now there must be also something to record into.

 

[Noiz2]

Now this is a hot topic!

Being one of those on the other side of the "divide" I'll toss my 2 cents in also.

First as has been pointed out your "expensive" prices are ridiculously low. You had like $200 for a shotgun being pricey... I can't think of a shotgun worth paying anything for that would be that low. The small recorders are mostly OK but the ones under a couple of hundred are pretty horrible to use. They sound OK but trying to actually use one in a production environment is just asking for trouble.

Most really cheap mics are just awful. There are some that are OK and people have recommended them.

The thing I've been recommending goes even farther than yours, I recommend that in most cases that newbe shouldn't buy anything. Shoot a few shorts before you buy anything beyond the camera. Your first bunch of films are going to be pretty awful anyway. Learn to shoot a film then start polishing up your game.

The problem I think a lot of us have is the new-newbe often comes on the list armed with a certain amount of web based (mis)information. So they ask questions that get expensive answers. Then they get outraged that it's expensive and THEN they mention that they are shooting on a $200 dollar camera and can only spend what they have saved from their allowance. When folks have come on and explained their situation the advice tends to be much closer to what they need.

And sometimes there is not an answer that doesn't cost$$$. THere isn't a wireless mic that is worth owning under $200, it just doesn't exist. Certain cheap pieces of equipment will actually make things worse.

And you will also notice that most of the more experienced folks just don't comment on some posts. Usually the ones that start off with "I want great sound" and then have some list of expensive items and an explanation of why they are not going to spend more than some tiny amount. They are also typically the ones who don't have any money left after buying the new camera or some fancy whatever for that camera. It's really ironic on a list named after a $4000 camera that after saying sound is 50% people then go ballistic when someone suggests they spend way less that 1/4 of what they spent on the camera and lights and tripod.

But I do think a sticky for DSLR would be good and a new entry level sound equipment for non sound people sticky also.

I will also add my vote to the Videomic connected to just about anything being a MASSIVE improvement over the built in mics on a bunch of the super cheap cameras. DSLR's certainly but there are a stack of 1/8" in video cameras that have god awful built in mics. Plus you can use the Video mic to get a better scratch track when you move up and those tiny recorders are great for stealing ambiences, so both fall under "only buy what you can move up with" rule.

 

[gpforet]

This has really opened up some interesting dialog. Here's my take on the whole sound/gear/price discussion:

Filmmaking has been and will continue to be a collaborative artform. In the same way that as a location sound person I would not do a very good job shooting a scene, or lighting a scene, or writing a scene, or acting in a scene, so it is with each area of expertise and/or talent.

I think the advise is appropriate that, to start out with, shoot what you want, however you want, and accept that it will serve not as some great film, but as a school of learning.

The argument that "I live somewhere where there is no one else interested in filmmaking" just doesn't fly unless that person lives in some far reaching edge of the universe. It makes even less sense that with all the filmmaking going on now, that someone would be delusional enough to think that it's better to start out on their own, rather than volunteer to work on other people's films in order to gain experience and knowledge about the filmmaking process. I get particularly tickled when I hear someone say how they are passionate about filmmaking in all it's aspects but would not even consider volunteering for craft services, or food prep, or set construction, or grip, or pulling cable, or editing.

I consider myself passionate about sound as a part in the filmmaking process. I consider myself part of a team, where each team member brings a specific set of skills. I recently watched an interview with Jeff Bridges. He said that it is in the COLLABORATIVE work of making the film in this shared environment of talent and passion that life and joy are experienced and the finished film is a souvenir of that experience.

Rather than think that somehow, with the right gear, one person can do it all, or know it all, is to take away from the magic that is experienced when a GROUP comes together to write, direct, act, shoot, record, edit, and then finally view a piece of work that is far greater than any individual and where the sum is far more than all of the individual parts.

 

[John Willett]

Now this is a hot topic!

Being one of those on the other side of the "divide" I'll toss my 2 cents in also.

First as has been pointed out your "expensive" prices are ridiculously low. You had like $200 for a shotgun being pricey... I can't think of a shotgun worth paying anything for that would be that low. The small recorders are mostly OK but the ones under a couple of hundred are pretty horrible to use. They sound OK but trying to actually use one in a production environment is just asking for trouble.

Most really cheap mics are just awful. There are some that are OK and people have recommended them.

The thing I've been recommending goes even farther than yours, I recommend that in most cases that newbe shouldn't buy anything. Shoot a few shorts before you buy anything beyond the camera. Your first bunch of films are going to be pretty awful anyway. Learn to shoot a film then start polishing up your game.

The problem I think a lot of us have is the new-newbe often comes on the list armed with a certain amount of web based (mis)information. So they ask questions that get expensive answers. Then they get outraged that it's expensive and THEN they mention that they are shooting on a $200 dollar camera and can only spend what they have saved from their allowance. When folks have come on and explained their situation the advice tends to be much closer to what they need.

And sometimes there is not an answer that doesn't cost$$$. THere isn't a wireless mic that is worth owning under $200, it just doesn't exist. Certain cheap pieces of equipment will actually make things worse.

And you will also notice that most of the more experienced folks just don't comment on some posts. Usually the ones that start off with "I want great sound" and then have some list of expensive items and an explanation of why they are not going to spend more than some tiny amount. They are also typically the ones who don't have any money left after buying the new camera or some fancy whatever for that camera. It's really ironic on a list named after a $4000 camera that after saying sound is 50% people then go ballistic when someone suggests they spend way less that 1/4 of what they spent on the camera and lights and tripod.

But I do think a sticky for DSLR would be good and a new entry level sound equipment for non sound people sticky also.

I will also add my vote to the Videomic connected to just about anything being a MASSIVE improvement over the built in mics on a bunch of the super cheap cameras. DSLR's certainly but there are a stack of 1/8" in video cameras that have god awful built in mics. Plus you can use the Video mic to get a better scratch track when you move up and those tiny recorders are great for stealing ambiences, so both fall under "only buy what you can move up with" rule.

I think Noiz has hit it on the head here.

When I started as a Newbie in the 1970's I got the most expensive equipment I could afford.

I researched, read magazines, and bought equipment that would maximise my budget and I would not have to buy again for a very long time.

My take-home pay was less than £100 a month at the time and my first tape recorder took almost all of that (and, yes, I still have it). I never wanted to compromise on quality, I monitored only on headphones for several years because I could not afford decent loudspeakers. I bought the best microphones I could afford - I went for quality rather than quantity.

Nowadays you can produce much better quality at a much much lower price (in percentage of earnings terms) than can be done when I started.

But I have only needed to sell my very first pair of mics - every other mic. I bought I still have and would sill be happy to use today. So the money was actually very well spent.

Buy too cheap and you throw away and spend all over again in a very short time. This actually makes it a lot more expensive than if you spent correctly in the first place.

Yes, many people over-spend on the video side and under-spend on the audio, even in many ways the audio is actually more important than the video.

If someone is at school and has a very low budget and says so, then he will normally get the best advice within his/her budget.

Sometimes it's actually much better to buy nothing and save up for something better which will do the job better and last longer.

When you read these forums you soon learn who the people are who really know their subject and you can trust.

 

[Michael Carter]

... I have recorded a full production rock song using only lavs. I have these two PinMics and a Rode Lav, and on a lark I decided to try to record a whole song using the mics as I would studio mics. And the sound ain't bad!

OK, that's a trip - I've seen several examples of people recording an entire rock song using only Sure 57's... but man, that takes the cake!

 

[Noiz2]

Yeah it's mostly about how you use the mic. The videoMic is the same capsule as the NTG-2, and that's a respectable shotgun. Sure there are much nicer ones, but you can get a great sound out of it. As a matter of fact I'll prove soon enough that its more about how you use the mic. I have recorded a full production rock song using only lavs. I have these two PinMics and a Rode Lav, and on a lark I decided to try to record a whole song using the mics as I would studio mics. And the sound ain't bad! Still editing the video - I recorded most of the parts simultaneously for video & audio. Not the vocals - I couldn't get those all the way through.. But here is the drum track. I used the Glyn Johns 3 mic method made popular with John Bonham of Led Zep. It's all how you use the mics....

The last sentence is what a lot of people starting out miss. Someone who knows what they are doing can get a lot more out of gear that it was designed for. All too often they would read that and take away that they don't need to get anything more than some lavs and they can do "great sound". It's not what you got nearly as much as how you use it. Sounds like a song title ;~)

 

[sonidista]

My opinion: It doesn't really matter with what kind of equipment you record your first movie. The first tries won't be good anyway, like Noiz has said well. And it doesnt really matter how much you've read on the web. Won't make you a better sound man than someone who has no internet. The key is experience, and knowing situations that come up in shooting movies. Once you know what it's like to do sound on a shoot, and once you've encountered difficulties and made mistakes, you can go and buy some gear. If you're starting out, likely you won't be able to tell the difference between the sound of many mics and mixers and headphones. It takes some time and practice. Again, mistakes are very important.

 

[Chadfish]

I am a firm believer in buying the right tool for the job, and spending till it hurts to future proof your gear and save money in the long run. But I also see the other side of the spectrum as an engineer I know I can bend a mics frequencies to do what I want if the mic was used correctly. Of course a better mic used correctly sounds better than a crappy mic used correctly, but many of the small differences in frequency charts of various expensive mics vs. mics of the same type but cheaper can be corrected with simple EQ. I think a lot of people doing sound for video need the mic to be perfect because they don't know how to adjust EQ, so the sound if the mic is the sound of their project ant that's the end of it. I would not choose a lav to record a kick drum, but in my experiment I found that I got an acceptable sound - much to my surprise. A PinMic on my bass cab sounded, well, bassy! Amazing. So even though I steer people away from buying thin sounding azden crap mics, I know I could make them sound good but why bother when you could save up another 100.00 and get something you don't have to massage. All the time I save NOT fixing tracks is worth much more than 100.00 If I save 2 hours of my time I have saved more than 100.00. So to not spend that 100.00 means I will be blowing thousands of dollars on MY TIME fixing things.

And if I wrote a song called "It's not what you got - it's how you use it" I don't think people would know I was talking about microphones...

 

[roei z]

soundwise, i cannot agree with "first movies will be crap". if i can direct a descent movie, but have less experience with obtaining good sound,
i better have at least some decent basic sound tools, i might get lucky and succeed in upgrading the film quality if i get good sound.
you have to get the minimum option to obtain it.

 

[Sam Mallery]

I don't assume anything about the people on the other side of these posts. Their first few projects may turn out poorly, or they may be onto something interesting. They may have spent $10,000 on camera and tripod, or they may be borrowing a camera and own nothing. They may be doing a low profile thing where they do much of the work themselves, or they may be working collaboratively in a group.

Most of the time we don't know anything about these people. And that's fine.

I just do my best to dispense the best advice I know of, and sometimes the best advice isn't telling them to only buy high end gear.

 

[Noiz2]

I don't want to piss on anyones parade but that just isn't realistic.
If you can direct a decent movie, then it's not your first. If you don't have a sound crew and hardly any of the inexperienced users do, in fact you can pretty much assume that if they are asking about mics, then you are not going to get very good sound. If you don't have the people to use the equipment then it's a bit silly to spend a bunch of money on it. The problems related to using it are going to hurt your film because you can only do so much and the more you try to do the less well you will do them. I don't care how young or eager you are, you can't do what it takes a hand full of specialists to do well all by your self. The vast majority of the new filmmakers posting will have no crew or a very small and inexperienced one. It doesn't help the film to toss equipment at them they don't know how to use.

Plus we haven't even touched on post.

It's nothing personal, look at Scorsese's student films - they are pretty crappy also. The stuff I did when I was learning is pretty crappy. It's only today in the marketing department created world of "instant pro" that people think they should be making blockbusters right off the bat.

Sorry it just doesn't happen except in movie puff pieces trying to sell the magic of it all.

I personally think it ruins more potentially decent filmmakers than anything else. This expectation of instant greatness. They jump in way over their head. Create this nightmare of a project and then never come back because it was such a bad experience. And there are so few other endeavors that have this problem. Can you imagine anybody taking seriously someone with a cheap consumer car expecting to win a major race? You would laugh at them. Or someone who had never trained planning on winning the Olympics? Never they would be ridiculed. But hand someone a camera they have never used before and suddenly they have dreams of instant grandeur.

The folks who you see surprisingly decent first efforts from have all (in my experience) had a fair amount of experience in or around filmmaking. They have worked on a lot of films and now they are directing for the first time. They also always have assembled a crew of people experienced in their crafts to help them out.

It's not a downside, it's reality and a great lifting of pressure. If your fist short sucks, that's fine. Your next one will be better. Your not a failure, your a real human and your learning.

soundwise, i cannot agree with "first movies will be crap". if i can direct a descent movie, but have less experience with obtaining good sound,
i better have at least some decent basic sound tools, i might get lucky and succeed in upgrading the film quality if i get good sound.
you have to get the minimum option to obtain it.

 

[roei z]

agreed,
but what i meant was maybe to avoid buying below basic equipment that will add almost nothing to your work, good or bad or whatever it turns out to be.

 

[Noiz2]

agreed,
but what i meant was maybe to avoid buying below basic equipment that will add almost nothing to your work.

very true.

 

[Michael Carter]

For some time it's seemed the bigger issue here is "do you want to shoot, direct, or do sound"? Lots of guys buying audio gear, so I suppose there's just not as many people (and young kids starting out) that want to do sound exclusively - or at least focus on that.

To me that says "hole in the market" - I could see being 16-25ish and deciding I'd be a serious sound guy and hire myself out, even to young-kids shooting first feature types. But maybe sound isn't as sexy as the other stuff.

I guess I'm assuming a lot of this thread originates from "kids" (and I mean that respectfully if you're a teen or college kid who's serious & obsessed with this stuff) - at that age, I played in bands. I didn't play bass or own a drum set - bands were little teams of peers that often got very good at what they did, usually with a strong "team" mentality. Were I in that boat today making films, I would do everything I could to create a "garage band" indie film group. DP, sound guy, art direction, a reasonable crew who could share the load and focus on important aspects of a short or feature.

In my town we have TWO competing Schools-of-Rock, and I've seen all-original bands of 12 year olds who were pretty good. Now there's a business plan - after-school-film-school. You should see the money these band parents spend on their kids... I bet there's a great business idea there somewhere... instead of a recital, it's a film festival... 3 times a year... hmmmm....

 

[unclebob6958]

The problem is that with a band everyone in the band can be a "star". There can only be one director; films by committee almost never work.

I do agree, however, that the "garage prod-co" will be a part of the future of filmmaking. A bunch of guys and gals who own and are familiar with their own instruments and have a unified concept and direction. All that is needed is the first "Beatles" of indie film to ignite the trend.

 

[sonidista]

well it's not quite indie, but I read that the folks behind Eastbound and Down (and lots more films/tv stuff) have that garage band/friends mentality. And they switch between acting/directing etc. too.

 

[gpforet]

Since when is the director considered the "star'?

The problem is that with a band everyone in the band can be a "star". There can only be one director; films by committee almost never work.

I do agree, however, that the "garage prod-co" will be a part of the future of filmmaking. A bunch of guys and gals who own and are familiar with their own instruments and have a unified concept and direction. All that is needed is the first "Beatles" of indie film to ignite the trend.

 

[unclebob6958]

Since when is the director considered the "star"?

Since behind the camera s/he is the one with the final say on everything. A band can work by mutual consent, a film can only have one director.

 

[adamr316]

I don't want to piss on anyones parade but that just isn't realistic.
If you can direct a decent movie, then it's not your first. If you don't have a sound crew and hardly any of the inexperienced users do, in fact you can pretty much assume that if they are asking about mics, then you are not going to get very good sound. If you don't have the people to use the equipment then it's a bit silly to spend a bunch of money on it. The problems related to using it are going to hurt your film because you can only do so much and the more you try to do the less well you will do them. I don't care how young or eager you are, you can't do what it takes a hand full of specialists to do well all by your self. The vast majority of the new filmmakers posting will have no crew or a very small and inexperienced one. It doesn't help the film to toss equipment at them they don't know how to use.

Plus we haven't even touched on post.

It's nothing personal, look at Scorsese's student films - they are pretty crappy also. The stuff I did when I was learning is pretty crappy. It's only today in the marketing department created world of "instant pro" that people think they should be making blockbusters right off the bat.

Sorry it just doesn't happen except in movie puff pieces trying to sell the magic of it all.

I personally think it ruins more potentially decent filmmakers than anything else. This expectation of instant greatness. They jump in way over their head. Create this nightmare of a project and then never come back because it was such a bad experience. And there are so few other endeavors that have this problem. Can you imagine anybody taking seriously someone with a cheap consumer car expecting to win a major race? You would laugh at them. Or someone who had never trained planning on winning the Olympics? Never they would be ridiculed. But hand someone a camera they have never used before and suddenly they have dreams of instant grandeur.

The folks who you see surprisingly decent first efforts from have all (in my experience) had a fair amount of experience in or around filmmaking. They have worked on a lot of films and now they are directing for the first time. They also always have assembled a crew of people experienced in their crafts to help them out.

It's not a downside, it's reality and a great lifting of pressure. If your fist short sucks, that's fine. Your next one will be better. Your not a failure, your a real human and your learning.

Great post! Very well said and something every new filmmaker should know. I would never show my early videos to someone wanting to hire me on a gig.

 

[Chadfish]

I kind of lucked out. I had done a little bit of video editing - like 3 school related videos for class projects. I bought a VX2100 camera and talked my way into working at this marketing agency. My specialty was audio/music, and I could offer my potential employer a low risk way to hire me. I was injured on a previous job, and workman's comp would pay half my wages (up to 8 bucks an hour) for 6 months. So I told my boss that for 4 bucks an hour I could teach myself video really quickly. It took a while to convince him, but I got the job. Within a couple months I got my first chance to do an ad for a client. They needed a jingle and a branding ad. I am a musician, so I wrote, performed & recorded this tune, then just went out and shot around the store to make the ad. Over 6 years later and they still play it on TV! Not that it's some masterpiece. Granted, there was no production sound. Nobody talking on camera. I did make a lot of mistakes and learn before I had my own recipe for successful audio. But my point is that your first work doesn't have to suck. You can actually read stuff and learn some things. How does that quote go? "The smart man learns from his mistakes. The wise man learns from the mistakes of others. "